In Tulsa’s first public State of the City address “in a very, very long time,” Mayor Monroe Nichols told residents Wednesday night that it’s time to “get serious” about major issues facing the community, and he firmly supported a pair of proposed tax increases aimed at funding solutions, despite a procedural setback to putting the measures before voters.
Members of the Tulsa Indian Club greeted attendees as they filed into the Chapman Music Hall’s lower level at the Tulsa Performing Arts Center. While the annual speech has been delivered to the Tulsa Regional Chamber since 1998, Nichols opted to deliver his address at a free, public event. (He is still scheduled to present a version of the speech to the chamber Nov. 20, with attendance to that speech carrying a $150 price tag.)
After a short opening ceremony and introduction, Nichols began his remarks by outlining a litany of issues facing Tulsa.
“Let me be clear. We have to get serious about the things that are in front of us: the time when the homelessness crisis grew by 20 percent the year before I took office; the reduction in confidence that we can keep our city safe from violence; children and vulnerable families suffering from the impacts of cuts to core services and pockets of economic inequality; and a fracture in our relationship with our tribal nations always threatening any progress we make as a city,” Nichols said. “I mention these not for doom and gloom or for shock and awe, but because I think it’s important to be serious about reality.”
While Nichols kept a serious tone throughout the event, a moment of levity came when a microphone malfunction filled the theater with a sound akin to firecrackers and Nichols was brought a new microphone.
“Sometimes being mayor is like being a toddler, you take a step and people clap,” Nichols quipped after he received applause for testing the new mic. “It’s interesting.”
‘Rare, brief, non-recurring’: Mayor outlines homelessness, housing goals
While Nichols’ speech covered topics from public safety to tribal relations, both homelessness and housing affordability emerged as dominant topics.
“There is no city, midsized or larger, in America that isn’t dealing with the issue of homelessness, and Tulsa is no different,” Nichols said. “This year, we witnessed an 18 percent reduction in the growth of homelessness, according to our point-in-time count. (It is) a testament to the ongoing work across our community. But a reduction in growth was never our ultimate goal. Our goal has always been ending homelessness as we know it and making it rare, brief, and non-recurring.”
While he acknowledged homelessness has continued to grow in Tulsa, Nichols argued his administration’s Safe Move Tulsa initiative — which seeks to provide every occupant of a homeless encampment with shelter or services before the camp is decommissioned — would be a major step toward reducing homeless. At the same time, he said Gov. Kevin Stitt’s operation SAFE — which saw Oklahoma Highway Patrol troopers decommission homeless encampments on state property — created an “uptick in emergency room visits” by displacing homeless individuals across the city without a workable process for providing shelter or services.
He also touted the opening of a winter weather shelter and the city’s effort to secure a location for a low-barrier shelter.
Nichols linked the problems of homelessness and affordable housing, before arguing in favor of fast-tracking building permits for housing, “offering additional incentives to developers to assist them with permitting costs,” and changing zoning laws to allow more housing to be built.
“Our local data is clear. The lack of affordable housing is the primary cause of homelessness, and 46 percent of Tulsans are cost burdened by housing costs,” Nichols said. “Affordable housing is a driver of homelessness and one of the greatest threats to our economic progress overall.”
He singled out this year’s passage of HB 2147, a bill advocated for by the City of Tulsa to let municipalities bring foreclosure proceedings on properties that fail to pay $1,500 in municipal “fees, penalties, abatement costs.” Stitt vetoed the measure, but the Legislature overrode the veto at the behest of Tulsa’s lobbyists and other interested parties.
Wednesday night, Nichols asked the Tulsa City Council to pass an ordinance implementing the bill to tackle “blighted” properties.
“In the coming weeks, I will ask the city council — and it’s something we’ve been working on together — to provide the city with additional tools to rid our neighborhoods of non-owner-occupied blighted properties as part of our effort to reduce blight by 60 percent over the next three years,” Nichols said. “I thank the Oklahoma Legislature for the passage of HB 2147, which actually required a veto override, because this bill allows us to take eyesore properties and turn them into nice, affordable properties, leading to the kind of neighborhood revitalization Tulsans deserve without gentrifying our neighborhoods.”
During his mayoral campaign last year, Nichols promised to lobby for such a bill, which Stitt criticized in his veto message of HB 2147.
“This bill is a solution in search of a problem,” Stitt wrote, ultimately in vain. “Minor code violations can now result in property liens against Oklahomans. This enables expanded condemnation and public taking without providing property owners adequate due process protections. Eroding private property rights is not an appropriate response to municipal code fines.”
Push for sales, hotel tax increase continues
During Wednesday’s address, Nichols acknowledged that the Tulsa City Council has not agreed with his preferred timeline for a proposed sales tax increase, which his office had hoped to set for a February election. Still, Nichols maintained that discussions on the proposal must continue.
“It was my goal to make sure that we could include that in this year’s budget, but I recognize that running a big city means there is a lot of opinions,” Nichols said.
Explaining his proposal, Nichols advocated that additional tax revenue be used to increase funding for Tulsa’s police and fire departments, fund his housing and homelessness plan, and provide funding for afterschool and summer learning programs.
Hours before Nichols delivered his speech, the Tulsa City Council moved two tax increase proposals — a 4.25 percent increase to the city’s hotel tax (for a total rate of 9.25 percent) and a 0.7 percent increase to the city’s sales tax (for a total rate of 4.35 percent) — back to committee. Both proposals would require voter approval if passed by the council.
While he agreed with the decision to table the sales tax increase, Councilman Christian Bengel expressed support for passage of the hotel tax hike before both measures were refereed to committee.
“This isn’t a tax that is imposed on our citizens directly. This is more of a visitors’ tax,” Bengel said. “This feels like something that’s a little easier for me to pass than [the sales tax increase].”
Council Chairman Phil Lakin said the council would likely take both measures up again in January. The brief discussion Wednesday seemed to imply the hotel tax increase proposal has more council support than the sales tax increase. With neither measure reaching the deadline for a February election, the odds of a potential Tulsa tax increase coinciding with the 2026 statewide primary, runoff or general elections has increased.
